He stands in the detergent aisle at Sainsbury’s unsure of which one she’s sent him to buy. He tries to remember the box that always sits on the floor of their basement. It’s blue. He squints trying to remember. Isn’t the writing pink? He looks for such a box but nothing like that is on the shelves. He doesn’t want to text her to ask. He can only imagine what name she’d call him for not even knowing the laundry detergent she uses on his clothes.
Persil? No. That’s green. Tide? The box is too orange. He’d have remembered if it was that. Why should he have to do this, he wonders. It had already been dark when he arrived home. Her first question was, “Did you remember to pick up the detergent?”
He’d looked at her but not at her eyes. She knew he hadn’t. No shopping bags were in his hands.
“No.”
“Jesus! You can’t do anything right, huh? Bloody idiot.” She’d muttered this under her breath but loudly enough for him to hear.
Ignoring her, he slipped into the kitchen to make himself a cup of tea hoping that she’d forget about it. He’d get it first thing in the morning before biking into the work.
She’d waited, though. She always does. He sat at the dining room table, the cup of steaming tea quickly cooling in front of him. The house is always cold at her insistence. Loosening his tie, he took a timid sip. Another, then another — the hot liquid slipping down his throat. He felt it unwrapping the knots in his muscles. He began to scroll through messages on his phone relaxing into the chair. Perhaps she’d let it go.
Her voice carried through from the kitchen into the dining room.
“Sunil” she called, her voice loud and sharp. “Sunil...you’ll have to go get some before dinner. I need it tonight.”
Sunil sighs and stares at the boxes. He never imagined that this is what his life would unravel and become. When he married her, and she’d come to England, she was charmed by it all. Was excited by every new thing. Trains. Snow. Leaves. The smells of the expensive shops. That was so long ago. He isn’t suffering for money. He’s worked hard and made it. So why does he have to, close to 9:00 pm, stand in a cold, almost emptied out supermarket, staring at laundry detergent.
This is bullshit!
He grabs a box of detergent from the shelf and stalks to the checkout. He drops the carton so hard on the belt that some detergent comes loose. They fall like tiny white snowflakes on the black conveyer belt. The word Snow on the box doesn’t even register on his brain.
He walks the few blocks to their house, a house in a trendy part of London. He places the box on the doorstep and stands for a long moment staring at the word on the box. He feels the first flake touch his cheek, the second land softly on the back of his neck. He looks up. Soft feathery white flakes drift slowly downward and land on his black coat – then disappear. Telling him what to do.
Slowly, he turns on his heel. He walks down one block, then the other. Then the next and the other one after that. Only after he has covered so many blocks, he has lost count does he text her.
Snow is on the doorstep. This is what you wanted, no?
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Life a farren. But the truth is, many relationships are like this no matter where.